Friday, July 13, 2018

Drought? Really?

You have all heard that the Pacific Northwest is always wet and rainy! Well, not this year! May and June had lower than average rain and July is going that way also. I can't say we have had a lot of hot weather BUT it hasn't rained much. Now we are getting the warm weather. which I love. But I know the forest and brush fires will probably be bad. I can remember one summer when our kids were around five or six when my husband was away fighting forest fires most of the summer and into early fall. I would hardly get his dirty, smelly, smoky clothes clean before he would get called out again. We weren't making tons of money with the USFS but when he fought fire he got hazard pay and overtime so it always helped us out financially! But it was hard on me and the kids. We didn't have a chance that summer to cut wood so we had to have a load delivered and they dumped it in the carport. I couldn't get my car out of the garage until the wood was gone so the kids and I had to get it stacked in the woodshed. That was during the same period of summer when I was doing most of the canning. But I was young and had tons of energy and the kids, even though they were small were a big help. They were good kids. After we moved up here the kids all picked berries when they were younger and then the boys hayed and ran peapicker machines. Our daughter babysat and took a bus to work at a restaurant when she was old enough. I guess we were not good parents because they worked but they sure turned out to be hard working, responsible adults that we are very proud of.

We didn't do anything special on the 4th of July this year. I didn't think my knee was up to having the kids over so we sat around outside and read. Then went to DQ for some ice cream and fries! Not very exciting but we are old so it was fine....

I am not enjoying this summer as much as usual because my right knee is so bad. I abused it for so many years running every day, etc. Then crashing during a motocross really did it in and I had to have surgery and wore a cast for a month or more. Then several years later they had to do another surgery but it has never been the same and has really gotten bad this summer for some reason. I am hoping that wearing my brace and trying to take care of it, it will get better by itself. It always has before...

Well, our "president" is overseas embarrassing us again. I hope the world doesn't judge us by him. Most of us don't believe or "think" like him. Enough said.

It doesn't seem like as many themes are bring submitted this summer. I imagine all the younger people are having a life and not working on them. But this old lady is still working away. Have even learned a few new things on my Photoshop program. There is so much to do but at my age, it is not an easy program to learn. And it infuriates me when I do something and then can't remember exactly what brush I used or exactly how I did it. I try to write it down but sometimes I forget to do that!

Apparently there is going to be some big changes for Themes. I don't know how that is going to affect me and my themes. One thing I do know is they are apparently going to do away with the preview of how it will look on your screen. So stay tuned and watch out for changes. I hope it doesn't change the themes themselves but it may. I will just have to wait and see.

The orchid one of our neighbors gave me at Christmas is doing so well. I love flowers but do not have a green thumb so I am amazed my orchid is doing so well. I Googled how to water it and I watched 2 You Tube videos that an expert orchid grower had put on and have followed his instructions and apparently he knew what he was talking about because mine is doing well! So it is time for me to go take care of mine!

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(A little about me)

I once said I never wanted a computer, BUT...one of my grandson's is in the IT Department at WWU and installed Firefox when he built my desktop computer. I really like it and won't use any other browser now. It is safe, fast and has tons of extensions to make it easy for your browsing. One of the add ons they have available are themes which they used to call Personas. They had been called Personas for several years and became very popular, but someone at Mozilla got the bright idea to change the name. Whatever you want to call them they are still a fun quick way to make your browser personal. You can find my Persona/Theme designs at:https://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/gallery/Designer/MaDonna

I make desktop wallpaper designs to match many of my themes, which you can use as background themes for GMail. You can also use them as a wallpaper for your cell phone. You can find my desktop wallpaper designs at: http://my.desktopnexus.com/MaDonnas/uploads/

I have been making theme designs for my own personal Firefox ever since it was installed. Then it was opened so you could submit designs for approval in 2008. My design called Sunset Over Water had over a million and a half people using it at one time. It is from a photo I took off Chuckanut Drive on our way home from a wedding.

I have always been interested in design. When I was a little girl I designed clothing for my paper dolls. Then designed and made clothes for my regular dolls. I made most of my own clothing in high school. When I was older I designed, sewed and made our 3 kids clothing. When they got married and started having babies I made tons of clothes for our 7 grand kids. I decided to sell some of my designs. Fibromyalgia decided to put a stop to that. Sewing for hours a day was just too much.

I am a bit of an over-achiever and when I start something, I don't know when to quit! I have done a little bit of sewing for our great grand kids, but I know I have a limit and when to stop.

I used to design and make jewelry and sold at bazaars which was a lot of fun.

I work on themes and desktop wallpaper designs almost every day and have enjoyed hearing from people all over the world.

I was asked to design themes for Brand Thunder. They have theme designs for people that use Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari and also Firefox. In 2012 I won a Nexus 7 tablet on a pop culture contest they held. They have changed their format so I don't make designs for them anymore.

I now use Photoshop Elements to make my designs. It is a very complicated program to use, especially at my age of almost 80.

Thank you all for your comments and using my designs. I will keep making them as long as I can and people enjoy using them.

A BIT MORE!

I love nature and the beauty of the Pacific Northwest, the animals
that roam our forests and back yards. That is the reason most of my
designs are nature based. I love going up into the mountains with my
husband of 61 years. He knows the mountains well and can take me places
where I can take photos I can use for both Persona designs and
wallpapers. It is getting harder and harder for me to take really good scenic shots, though, because of my age!

We have 3 grown children, 6 grandsons, 1 granddaughter, 4 great
grandsons and 1 great granddaughter. My family is the most important part of my life. I don't
get to see my brother or sister as much as I would like as we all live
in different states and I am not a traveler. My family moved a lot when I
was growing up and I pretty much like to just stay put now.

I loved riding dirt bikes and ATV's. I used to ride my Yamaha dirt bike in poker runs, enduro's and motocross and have a lot of trophies to show for it. And one bad knee after two surgeries! I rode dirt bikes before they had motocross gear for women. Had to buy gear for boys! But my most favorite thing was riding my Kawasaki 454 LTD road bike. My husband had a 454, too and we would go on cross country trips, especially to Winthrop, WA. My last year to ride was when I was 71 years old and it was hard to give up but I knew my strength wasn't up to it anymore. Summer isn't quite as much fun now because I can't ride, but I have so many wonderful memories.

I was born and raised a farm girl. In the early 1990's my husband and I started a group to protect the 500+ acre ranch close to us. A Japanese company had purchased it and wanted to build a development with over 2000 houses. Over 600 people from the community joined our group and we were successful in stopping the development. But instead of farming it like it should be, they built a golf course! We still do all we can to help preserve the farm land.

I have been doing a bit of freelance work, such as designing book covers, business cards, calenders, etc. It all keeps me very, very busy. Plus getting older it doesn't get any easier.